cindy's world

I’m over it.

While waiting to meet Grace’s dad at the property, I got there first and parked. A few minutes later, a pick-up truck pulled up behind me and a man and his very annoying needs-Ritalin-pronto son got out. I didn’t get out and talk to them, but they walked onto the property but couldn’t get in because they need an agent who can open the lockbox for the key. Mr. W arrived next, and said hello to the man, asking if he’s here to see the property, too. They chatted for a long time before Mr. W came back to me to report. According to the guy, who’s meeting his agent there, too, he has put an offer on the house already. And he’s only 1 of 14 offers. Assuming he’s telling the truth, then the bank probably low-balled the offer price deliberately to generate the highest level of response it can for a sale. Maybe it’s hoping for a bidding war. This was distressing and discouraging.

A good thing happened, though. After Grace’s dad arrived and we got a good look inside the house, my interest waned considerably. It is the best house we’ve seen so far anywhere near that price range, and altho it is fixed up and pretty nice, it is nowhere as great as I’d thought it was last night. It’s definitely still more move-in ready than the other short sale house, but on closer inspection there were little details wrong with it. A crack in the foyer tile. Stinky old carpet. The carpet was stained upstairs. The bathrooms, altho upgraded, aren’t THAT nice. The downstairs powder room needed its countertops updated. The inside of the kitchen cabinets are lined with half-removed old adhesive shelfing paper. Some of the cabinet doors were sitting crooked. The insides of the drawers were gross. I don’t think they changed the cabinetry so much as simply gave it a new maple resurface. The pool was dirty (altho yes, that’s just superficial). These are all small, inexpensive things, but it just kinda burst my bubble, is all. Strangely, Mr. W’s interest was piqued. In the exact opposite way that I was disappointed, Mr. W was impressed. It was worse than I’d imagined, it was better than Mr. W had imagined. So now HE wants the house and I’m kinda “eh” about it. Maybe that’s the way it’s supposed to be.

I asked Grace’s dad what he thought. He said the asking price was very good, but the house itself needed some TLC. Yeah, exactly. To me, the inside of the house also appeared to be bigger from the outside looking in, than it actually was once you’re in. Altho the four bedrooms upstairs are pretty spacious, more so than the other house, too. We decided that we’d put in a bid for the house at the asking price, and let our credit speak for itself. If one of the other bidders wants it more badly than us and is putting a ton of money down on it, then fine, they can have it. If someone else is bidding over the asking price and their credit can survive that, then fine. We’re leaving it to the hands of fate, but we’re really okay either way. So by this time Sunday, we’ll have two active offers out on two short sales. And we’re still not quitting our house hunt. “The one” may still be out there.

Since we had a realtor on hand, the three of us went to see the two other properties that we’d seen immediately before we saw this property yesterday. Even with more daylight, the back yard that scared me yesterday still scared me. But that was nothing compared to the inside of that house. It smelled of paint or varnish, it was old, all the closets were the old hinged door style and small, one bedroom had a deep brownish stain in the center that looked like some poor dog or child had been hung and killed suspended from the ceiling fan in the center of the ceiling (this is the house with the weird fenced kennels in the yard), one bathroom was painted black with almost Satanic-like frescoes painted into the shower. Mr. W warned me not to look in that bathroom but I did anyway. I’ve learned to trust him on stuff like that next time. As for the other house, we didn’t even bother going inside, just looked around the outside and that was more than enough. I now think that the reason “the one” glowed so brightly to me yesterday was cuz we saw that after the first two. How perspectives can be altered due only to context.

A Friday and belated V-Day ha-ha, from my judge:

A guy walks into a post office one day to see an overweight, middle-aged, bald man standing at the counter methodically placing “love” stamps on a huge stack of bright pink envelopes covered in hearts. The man then took out a perfume bottle and spritzed each envelope. His curiosity gets the better of him, so the guy asks the man what he’s doing. The man says, “I’m sending out 1,000 Valentine cards signed, ‘Guess who?’ ”
“But why would you do that?”
“I’m a divorce lawyer,” the man replied.

Yesterday evening, on Valentine’s Day, I fell in love. I didn’t really expect to, I figured I’ll settle and be just fine. Happy sometimes, even. Besides, I’ve already got one foot halfway into another, altho the contract hasn’t been written yet and it’s not binding technically. Yet.

I don’t think there’s just one “the one” in our lives. Sometimes there are two or three “the one”s, cuz that one is the best one for our lives right now. I just know that when I recognize one of these “the one”s, I can instantly see the future flash before me, I can picture myself there, and I’m so happy. I can think about nothing else and all the molecules around me spark with energy and I get beyond restless. It’s happened to me before when I’ve found other “the one”s.

So it was last nite that I ran around in circles, exclaiming over and over, “Oh my God. I love it. I love it. It’s perfect. Oh my God.” That house that Vicky found online and told me about? Mr. W and I went to take a look at it last night on our way to dinner. Sure our offer for our short sale house JUST went in that day, but it doesn’t hurt to keep our options open for something more ideal. We first hit up 2 or 3 other houses on the way, and even tho some were pretty cool or had interesting floor plans and I could live with it, none of them spoke to me or excited me. One had a backyard that scared me. I swear, I think they abused dogs or children and there are body parts still buried back there among the overgrown shrubs and weird sectioned-off kennels and cages. *shudder*

And then last on our list was THE house. It has a huge 3-car driveway, so wide that “I can Zaino my car sideways on it!” I said, so wide that “You can do donuts in your car on it,” Mr. W said. The neighborhood is older but well-manicured and totally upgraded. The 2500 square foot house looks like it had a recent face lift with beautiful new double-front-doors and a generously-sized raised platform wooden porch. The lights are on inside the house although it’s already vacant, and I gasped at the custom paint, the crown moldings, the carpet, the upgraded designer interior. The back yard gate was unlocked so in a delirium I ran to the back and nearly fell into the GIANT new pool, surrounded by a nice deck and fruit trees. (It was dark.) The clean white backyard patio rafters, Mr. W observed, is not wood, but fiberglass. No termite issues! Looking in from the back, I saw new granite countertops in the kitchen, recessed lighting, a nice center kitchen island, new stainless steel appliances. All totally new and upgraded. I even loved the bend in the staircase. In my mind, I SAW my life inside that house. I felt my happiness. I could feel Dodo’s happiness wandering around in there. It was totally move-in ready and costs THE SAME as the other house! (With the other house, we’d have to sink money into changing the carpet, small repairs on the floors and upgrading the bathrooms/bedrooms first.)

My realtor left for a week-long family trip yesterday, but had left me in the hands of Grace’s dad. I called him this morning to say hello and to tell him about the house, and he called me back with details. It is a short sale again (I’m fine with that, because the amount of time a short sale situation adds to the process will be beneficial to us; we can’t move in right away, anyway), it’s assessed at $200K more than it’s being offered for, and he’s free to let us in to look at it TONIGHT! I was SO excited when I hung up I couldn’t stop smiling as I called Mr. W to tell him the good news.

Due to the psychotically early meet-up time I made with Grace’s dad at the new property in my eagerness, I’d have no time to run home tonite to grab clothes and take care of Dodo’s food and whatnot for the weekend, so I was going to do it at lunchtime and skip the gym. In calling my gym trainee to tell her I wasn’t going to hit the gym with her today, I got a call in on my cell phone. It was my bank, congratulating me that I’ve been approved for my great HELOC (home equity line of credit), which I’d applied for at a crazy-low interest rate to use as down payment for the new house. I’ll be mailed closing documents on Wednesday and then I can throw my car loan into the HELOC, make it tax deductible, AND fund my path into my (uh, I mean “our”) new home!

Here’s the fated sequence of events…
1. We find the 1st short sale house.
2. We put an offer on that short sale house. (I run into Grace’s dad.)
3. I call and tell Vicky about it.
4. Vicky looks up that house online and says, “Hey, what about THIS house? It’s the same price.” She reads the description to me and I’m instantly intrigued.
5. Our realtor leaves the country. Mr. W and I visit that house. I fall in love, utterly, completely.
6. Grace’s dad is handling our stuff in our realtor’s absence.

It’s perfect! It’s GOT to be meant to be, right? EEEEEEEEEE!!!

What a difference a year makes. This exact day last year, according to a link Jordan found by googling “Cindy’s boobies” (see post and comments here), the blog post was all about nipple lengths and me, Jordan and Flat Coke challenging each other to flash everyone to see whether Asian nipples are elongated (on comments).

Just thought you’d like to know how in a year, I have matured and grown way too sophisticated to ever post a entry on Valentine’s Day mentioning things like boobies, nipples, elongated nipples, pornography, flashing my friends, or taking and comparing nipple measurements. I am too adult to type anything like that.

I’ve been wanting to post this every Valentine’s Day for years but I never remembered in time. I wrote this poem 2-14-94, my senior year in high school. (That’s important for the irony you’ll see.) It was published later on that year in a school publication.
Each time a reference to Valentine’s Day is written, the font is in a creepy horror-movie-title font, like with blood drippage coming off the letters.

V-DAY
The kid down the street
Sits up in bed at six
Alarmed as his alarm alarms him.

And in this state of panic
His feet hammer out something drastic
Just as his young heart mimicks his alarm.

Having forgotten it was Valentine’s
He frantically cuts flowers fresh off the vine
And in so doing, draws blood the color of the maroon petals.

In school, the boy greets Little Suzie,
Presents her with his flowers, still a little woozy
From his tremendous outpour of blood.

Suzie’s lush lips stretch into a smile
As she eyes the beautiful red pile
Of flowers, and blushingly accepts the gift.

She giggles and wiggles and squirms all day
Looking so forward to her luncheon date
With the little, young twelfth grade boy.

Amongst all this hustle and bustle
Of young, immature kids
Whose clanging, clamoring hearts still believe in Valentine’s Day

I sit, and observe
And occasionally laugh
At all the silly, unrealisitic lovesick fools

And wish that one time more
I could be a part
Of all this fuss over nothing on Valentine’s Day.

Smart-Dressed Man: A woman who bought my real estate system bought this home pictured here for, believe it or not, $387. She got it as a government foreclosure, moved her family in, and they are now living free and clear with not one payment to make on it, ever.
Blonde Woman: Wow! Three hundred…and eighty-seven dollars? So she could turn it around and sell it for a lot more.
Smart-Dressed Man: That’s right. With my system, you can buy a house for literally pennies on the dollar, and live in it free and clear, never having to make a payment on it, or sell it on the market for the full estimated value, or get rich using it as a cash-flowing rental.
Inserted Testimonial of a Man: I bought the real estate system, read through it, and then bought ten properties, the lowest at $110 and the highest at $750, and I turned around and sold them for market price. I’ve made a huge profit of $110,000. And not a lot of people know about these government foreclosures and repossessions.
Blonde Woman: Wow! A hundred and ten thousand dollars! That’s a lot of money.
Smart-Dressed Man: This property pictured here has a market value of $120,000.
Blonde Woman: I believe it. It’s a beautiful house in a great neighborhood. There are a lot of expensive properties in that area.
Smart-Dressed Man: Can you believe, that someone using my system bought this house for $358?
Blonde Woman: That’s amazing!

Okay, so my question is, WHERE THE HELL ARE THESE PEOPLE selling these properties at, and WHY are they airing this infomercial in Southern California? Are they KIDDING? They may as well advertise dung beetle shish-kabobs for the same relevance in this market.

Remember those funny little anecdotes my judge was leaving for me on my desk? I got more today and these are my top 2 favorites:

#2
Q: What’s the difference between a good lawyer and a bad lawyer?
A: A bad lawyer can let a case drag out for several years. A good lawyer can make it last even longer.

#1
From Actual Court Records:
Judge: Please begin.
Counsel: Thank you. (to witness) Miss, while you have, if you do have — you still — oh, you don’t.
Judge: That was a great start, Counsel.

Before I write what I came here to write, I feel compelled to report that this morning, someone came upon my site by doing a search for “jordan boobies” on Google. Jordan, your boobies should feel honored. Especially since on your blog, you promote feeling them on the regular.

I had a great day at the spa yesterday. I hit the whirlpool, hit the steam room, and then got a relaxing 80-minute full-body massage that put me in a sort of trance-like state. After finishing, I let the massage oils absorb into my skin with another 10 minutes in the steam room, then hit the great rainfall showers. At one point I had water spraying on me from 3 different directions. By the end of my time there I didn’t even care that despite my recent weight loss, my stomach fat still jiggles as I walk, which I observed with dismay in the mirror as I went into the whirlpool in my bikini. (How low does my body fat percentage need to be to stop jiggling?)

After I went thru a few loads of laundry, I headed off to Mr. W’s house. He and I looked at a few more houses online that had dropped into our price range. Our realtor agent told us that we’re not locked into the short sale house, so if in the meantime we see something we like better, to feel free and explore other options. I personally have a problem with the short sale house’s bedrooms and bathrooms (BIG problems with their bathrooms), but the rest of the house is fine. But if houses formerly out of our price range lower their asking prices due to the spiraling market and fall into our price range and we don’t have to do any fixing-up to move in, so much the better. Vicky seems to have found such a house for us online and we looked at it online last nite. We were very interested and will probably drive by to look at it soon. It seems more move-in ready than the short sale house, is newer, is valued higher, has a prettier pool (Again with the pool. Why do people build so many pools?), is larger, and it’s the SAME PRICE!

I have faith that whatever happens will happen because it’s meant to and if I lose something I think I want, it’s because something bigger and better is around the corner that I’m meant for, and I trust the universe completely. Oh, and I had another perfectly reconciled credit card statement that accounted for every receipt I have, “coincidentally”.

I was about to set my alarm clock for tomorrow morning when I realized — wait a minute — I don’t have to go to work tomorrow. Happy Birthday, Mr. Lincoln! HA-ha! So tomorrow, whenever I get up, I’ll do some laundry. Then I have a 3pm appointment at Glen Ivy Day Spa for an 80-minute massage, courtesy Mr. W and my court reporter. My reporter had given me a gift e-certificate for Christmas, but I was so busy I never used it. Then a few days ago, I got another e-certificate from Mr. W for Valentine’s Day. His gift was so generous that I think I’ll have to split it up into two sessions. Upon receipt, I’d emailed him immediately to thank him, and to tell him to stop wasting our wedding money. I was joking. Partially.

Speaking of money, Mr. W and I went to our realtor’s office after work today and signed our house offer papers. And then we stayed and discussed our finances with him for an hour, figuring out ways to make ourselves more appealing to the bank for mortgage loans. The bank’s current formulas for risk assessment sucks. The crappy California housing market is making loans so hard to get; lenders are getting crazy conservative. By that, I mean stingy and paranoid. But we’re still in a pretty good situation to appear attractive to lenders. Jumbo loans are considered anything $417K and up, and those have higher interest rates, which is ridiculous cuz you can’t even get townhomes for under that price in Southern California these days (unless you’re going into seriously questionable neighborhoods with resale values inversely proportional to the probability that you’ll get shot living there). Luckily, it looks like an “economic stimulus package” bill is newly passed that increases the definition of a jumbo loan, just temporarily, to the neighborhood of the $700Ks. That means we’ll be able to get a higher loan for a decent house and pay a lower interest rate if we buy property this year. (If you read the article I linked to, it criticizes the effectiveness of this bill in warding off a recession, and claims it only helps certain people in certain financial situations in specific housing markets, and those people and situations listed includes us. And if the bill doesn’t stop the housing market from its continual slide downhill, well, then that’s just more affordable inventory for us to pick from.) What a stroke of luck! Interest rates are also about to drop again in a month. Housing prices are still spiraling downward as sellers get more desperate. This is the perfect time to buy. “It looks like everything is lining up perfectly for us,” Mr. W observed happily tonight during a dinner of Thai food. I reminded him that I’d told him last year that my finances always line themselves up magically, and that since he was going to be with me, his finances would line up, too, as a necessity by proxy. And maybe it wasn’t a coincidence that when we walked into my realtor’s office, the first person I ran into was Grace’s dad (also a realtor). I had no idea he worked with that company, and my realtor told me that he’s been there for about 2-3 years, which is approximately the period of time that I’d lost touch with Grace’s parents. It’s almost like Grace is sending her hello to me, letting me know that she’s watching over me and not to worry about finances, things will fall into place. I’d also gotten two other positive signs about finances in the past few days. One, I was balancing my checkbook, and for the first time that I can remember, it balanced out exactly between my checkbook register and the bank statement without my having to make adjustments to account for things that either haven’t processed or that I forgot to account for. Two, I was reconciling my receipts with my credit card bill and for the first time ever, I accounted for every receipt in my room without leftover receipts that didn’t show up on this billing cycle, and without receipts I still need to retrieve from my wallet downstairs.

I know this is way too much boring personal financial information, and it doesn’t mean anything to anyone except that I appear to be incredibly anal in accounting for my finances, but it means something to me as far as signs go. So I’ll just take it as that, that I’m being told celestially that I’ll be okay.

Here are a couple photos from Chinese New Year dinner.

Gong xi fah tsai!